The Evolution of Education

[ldsoftwaresteve]

TheBigDog:

My idea is to turn the financing of education on its head. I propose an education income tax. It would replace the property taxes typically used to pay the bulk of education today. It would also fund the privitization of the whole educations system. It would work like this...

Sorry Pal, I hate this idea. Here are my reasons:
1. Taxes remove the responsibility for learning from the individual and put it on the back of society. It's wrong right there, no need to look further. When you tell children that it's society's responsibility to TEACH them, you indirectly tell them it's not their responsibility to learn.
2. Survival is the responsibility of each person and learning is the single most important act we perform toward that goal. Education does not facilitate learning, in my humble opinion. Not when it's just rote memorization anyway.
3. Because 'society' has taken the responsibility for 'teaching' and literally defined what that means and incorporated that into legislation (specifying the curriculum) it has stolen the inherent values behind the choices of what to learn from the population, specifically, the youth.... and consequently horrendously warped mankind's future.
4. When society identifies the curriculum, the skillsets are carved in stone as though existence were truly understood. The truth is most of what I was taught in school doesn't even apply to me and much of it was basically wrong. But it was given to me as though it were truth. And it was bullshit. So, do you really think that what is being taught today is right? Really?
5. I think the biggest single disaster in the history of the United States was, is, and continues to be 'public education'.
6. If you think that any government entity can actually handle something as important as education, please see the centenial documentary on the wright brothers, ponder the fact that the government has NOT been involved in developing personal computers, consider the absolutely laughable cost of the U.S. Space program as opposed to the butterfly fart cost of Bert Rutans effort. Any time the government leaves its legitimate domain we have nothing but loss, pain, and a drain that cannot be plugged. Not to mention the fact that whatever they get into they need to restrict competition to cover their shameful failures.

7. The solution to public education is to destroy it.

[Eclogite]

BigDog,
as an ideal your suggestion has a lot of merit. I see one practical drawback that I'd like your comments on. There may be a way around it, but I can't see it from here.

The problem is the time gap. The teachers and school administration that put in the effort to students in their early years are forced to wait decades before they get any significant return.
For example, a student goes through her five to ten year education. She goes on, graduates from high school, goes on to college, does some postgrad work, etc. It is close to two decades before she is earning enough for the education tax to be producing meaningful return.

And where is the feedback in that? Have the techniques used been the right ones? Its just too long to wait - rather like steering a car based on directions sent by post to the driver by someone looking through a telescope five miles away.

As I say I like the underlying concept - contrary to lssoftwaresteve I think it society had better take responsibility for the education of its members. If they don't they suffer the consequences. (Perhaps Steve, you haven;t heard of enlightened self interest.) However, as a practical concept I fear it is doomed.

[Cedars]

There is some merit to your idea Big Dog. This could easily be implemented in private schools now. But heres the issue that I am not sure would hold up in court.

Can a child be charged a tax as an adult for a decision made by the parent? If it was implemented, could a student who was involved in this sytem (and became a lawyer) sue about the tax under the condition that they did not make the choice to enroll in this pre-adult schooling and therefore the contract made between the parents and the school is invalid once the child turned 18?

[InfiniteNow]

Funding is a hugely important factor, however, with some of the poor parenting issues that have arisen in multiple threads recently, I feel that there is a growing disrespect that students have for teachers, making it even more difficult to be a good teacher. Even the most motivated and inspired of teachers burns out in just a few years.

Money would help, certainly, but there are also problems with students who are disrespectful. One can only take so much of that before the wind is removed from their sails. Maybe better people would be attracted by the better income, but I'd be very interested to see if they do any better than those currently in the role.

[TheBigDog]

Two points to consider in this discussion.

1) This is not a tax that puts money into the hands of the government. The tax is paid the the educators of the student. This may require rechartering af all public education as private, with assistance money for special needs students being key to getting everyone included in the system. All the tax collected from this would go the the individuals or institutions that were responsile for educating the person being taxed. So, for the first time, quality teaching breeds quality returns. Those who give a quality education will get justly compensated. Those who do not, will not. The idea is to move to privitization of education. The government would be the one in a position to insure that funds are properly collected and paid.

Think of it as residuals being paid to the teachers for the work they did with children during their formative years.

Infinite, you are keen sighted as usual. Respect is a big issue in schools today. But the people doing the teaching have no vested interest in the actual future performance of their students. Neither do the administrators. Neither do the parents. As Socal Security has replaced family security the need for parents to insure their future by seeing their offspring successful has disappeared. Hopefully privitization and actual rewards for good work would help parents and teachers to find the methods of overcoming other obstacles to education, if for no other reason, for greed. I am confident that a healthy revenue stream based upon acheivment would foster innovations that we cannot think of right now, that will ohterwise never happen without a rethinking of the system.

I am going to see if I can get my mom to chime in on this topic.

Bill <--- Son of retired High School teacher

[ldsoftwaresteve]

TheBigDog:

This is not a tax that puts money into the hands of the government. The tax is paid the the educators of the student. This may require rechartering af all public education as private, with assistance money for special needs students being key to getting everyone included in the system. All the tax collected from this would go the the individuals or institutions that were responsile for educating the person being taxed. So, for the first time, quality teaching breeds quality returns. Those who give a quality education will get justly compensated. Those who do not, will not. The idea is to move to privitization of education. The government would be the one in a position to insure that funds are properly collected and paid.

I wish I could agree with you TBD, but I can't. Notice how the focus is on funding.... We tend to think that the problem is related to the money but it isn't. Strangely enough, it's not related to the teaching either. It's related to the learning. And if we are focused on their education, what happened to their learning?
The learning part is from the perspective of the student which is always what gets lost here when the subject is discussed - and, responsibility shifts from the student to society. Screwed again.
The primary focus should be to identify the most important goal here, which in my mind is how the child can learn the most in the shortest amount of time. If that is not the primary focus, then the system - whatever we set up - will become carved in stone and quickly worthless.
The fallacy is in thinking that one solution fits all children. I believe that children learn (best) in one of a few different ways, and that the optimum method is probably context sensitive and every system I've heard of totally ignores identifying and tailoring the 'teaching' to the individual child. If the approach is from any other direction, the likelihood of its being correct is slim. Again: how the child can learn the most in the shortest amount of time must be the primary focus. That implies that the system must change because that kind of goal drives change.
An ideal system should have at least the following characteristics:
1. It should be fun for the learner.
2. It should encourage logical thought.
3. It should encourage a respect for the search for truth.
4. It should be designed to react to the strengths and weaknesses of the student.
5. It should subtly work to strengthen the student's weaknesses while moving forward with the student's strengths.
6. It should focus on individual mental and physical skills.
7. All 'knowledge' should be presented in a way that shows 'this is what we think is correct but there is always the chance that we might be mistaken'.
8. Graduation needs to be redefined.

But how do you implement such a system? I don't know. But just because I don't know that doesn't mean it isn't the correct approach.

One possibility might be something like the following:

Say you took the 10 best algebra teachers in the country and asked them to design the best algebra course ever. You give them a building. You give them technicians that will respond to what they need. You give them video experts and you give them students. And you give them a big incentive to do it quickly and do it well.
You record each class, each teacher, all students. You do this for one year. Analysis should begin immediately.

The intent is to design and build a system that teaches algebra interactively using computers with individual teacher help when needed. No 'classes'. No lectures. Different way of doing things.

Each instance of confusion should result in a modification to the system. You do this until students breeze through the subject.

Now the algebra teachers are free to do something else, like build upon the first course, continue on to geometry, trig, calculus, etc.